Points of Departure
by SomethingProfound11
Summary: Oneshots, fragments and short stories set in the Sea of Stars verse. Chapter 3: The Marsh Flies - a young Second Lieutenant Emilia Shepard is in command for the first time. An ambush has unexpected consequences.
1. The Runner

Her entire life, Amina Waaberi runs.

She's the quickest out of her siblings and their neighbours. She is not the strongest, or the best with the first touch when they pile into one big, riotous football game on the street, but she is the fastest. They can never catch her. She runs, bare feet raising puffs of dust, sweat running down her forehead.

She runs when her grandfather clutches at his chest when she is fifteen and gangly, when he falls over the canjeero, the bread sticking to his cheek _. Get the doctor! _Her father says and he hands her his old, battered rifle. It smacks against her spine with every step, leaves a bruise that lingers long after they take her grandfather away and her father and brothers go to wash what remains with warm water and wrap him in sheets of white.

She prays to Allah for the strength to bear the tearing in her chest, the wondering - _I could have run faster - _as the imam's voice rises and falls.

She runs seven blocks when the Alliance comes to Mogadishu looking for recruits. H er mother is proud, her father worried. Her siblings make her promise to send vid mails as soon as she can, even though she reminds them that during basic the recruits are not allowed any contact with the outside world.

Amina nearly misses the bus to the East Africa Recruit Training Depot, so she can wave one last time, and has to run to make it. That's the last time she's home for almost a year and a half. After basic training, there is Marine Combat Training, and then assaultman Individual Training. They teach her how to fire assault rockets, breach doors, set off all kinds of explosives. She finds her second great love besides sprinting.

The galaxy unfolds in front of her. She isn't just the youngest of five children anymore - she's Private Amina Waaberi, Systems Alliance Marine Corps Infantry.

They send her to war.

She sends vid mails to her parents and her siblings and her cousins; vid mails that don't mention all the blood and death, the way it tears at the soul, the way she still enjoys it all - the work, the thrill, the way the other Marines are like her blood and her bones.

After sixteen months of chasing slavers across the Traverse, her platoon sergeant pulls her aside and asks her if she's ever considered ICT. She hasn't. He tells her she should.

The Alliance sends her back to Earth, to the jungles of Brazil. They hammer at her very being, with forced marches and the mud that sucks at her feet, the push ups on the beach where the waves batter her, push her into stress positions and scream at her. But she doesn't break. She rises every time they force her to the ground. In the end they give her a clean uniform and call her _Raider. _N5.

And then they send her back to war, aboard the SSV _Normandy. _

The night the ship dies, she's sitting with the man she hopes to one day bring to meet her family. She tries to teach Timothe Somali - tries, because she's impatient - but enjoys the way his mouth wraps around the words, even when he stumbles, before the alarm cuts through their conversation like a knife.

He shouts that he has to get to the guns, because they're down and he is responsible for repairing them, he has to, he has to -

But Lieutenant Adams is there, his arm smoking and blistered. There's nothing left to fix, he tells them, the gun is in half, the gunnery and the CIC are just _gone. _They need to go. Amina pushes Timothe into Adams' grip, tells them to leave, but she has to get her Marines.

She leaves, and doesn't look back.

Sergeant Amina Waaberi runs -

But the shrapnel catches her.


	2. The Knock

Tommy Ling hated this duty. His best friend, walking point, had stepped right into a monofilament wire and Tommy had caught the end of it - razor sharp pain that slashed his calf to red meat. Lying there in his best friend's blood, and in the sort of pain that shouldn't exist, he'd thought that this was the worst the Corps could do to him.

Then, Staff Sergeant Tommy Ling had gotten out of hospital and the Marine Corps had told him he couldn't fight with a leg like that so they were sending him to train up reservists for the war. And he'd found out that he'd been wrong.

"Need to run over the script?" asked the lieutenant sitting next to him in the skycar. Like him, she was dressed in the deep cobalt of her dress uniform.

"No, ma'am." Tommy shifted to check his ribbons were all straight. Matthieu would've laughed to see him in his dress blues. _Only took your funeral to get me in the blues, brother. _"I've done a lotta them."

So many since Eden Prime, that he'd started keeping his dress uniform in his car with a lint roller to make up for a lack of dry cleaning.

The officer paused, staring at the rustic log house through the skycar window. "Yeah. Me too."

"Then let's get this done, ma'am," Ling told her. They were in the moment before the fall, staring over the edge of the cliff. But stepping back wasn't an option; there was only one road ahead of them. Forward and into the fall.

The two Marines got out of the sky car, put their covers on their heads and straightened their uniforms. The house looked oddly at home amongst the snowy peaks of Elysium, like a scene out of a postcard. They walked up the freshly shovelled driveway, snow crunched under each black booted step. Tommy wondered about the man that had lived here, the brother he'd never met. Had he shovelled this driveway? Picked up that little bike with training wheels and put it aside?

They came to a door. There was always a door. They were all different: some of them had elaborate security systems, some were propper open, some of them were wood, some of them were sleek metal. This one was teak with an old style door knocker in the centre, a real blast from the homeworld's past.

Right now, the staff sergeant wished he was shooting at geth or maybe walking into another wire. He'd never get used to this shit.

He knocked three times with a white gloved hand. He listened to approaching footsteps and braced himself. His eyes flicked to the window and the blue star stuck to the glass.

A woman stood there. Young, dark hair, a gold ring on her finger as she grabbed the door frame, knuckles going white as she saw the uniforms.

They always knew. Tommy could always see it. The moment they saw the uniforms, the moment it hit them. This woman was no different.

When you loved a Marine, there was only one reason two Marines in dress uniforms came to your door with their hats in their hands.

"Ma'am, are you Valeriya Dubyansky?"

"Yes," she said hoarsely. Behind her he could see the bright plastic of a child's toys.

"Ma'am, I'm First Lieutenant Maria Santiago and this is Staff Sergeant Tom Ling. May we come in?"

Valeriya's face was bone-white. "He's hurt, isn't he?" There was a pleading edge to her voice. "He's hurt."

"Can we come in?" Tommy repeated gently.

"No, no!" She collapsed in on herself, only the doorframe keeping her upright. There was a hint of an order in her voice. "Tell me he's hurt!"

But that was one order neither of them could obey.

Santiago straightened beside him. "Mrs Dubyansky, the Systems Alliance Marine Corps deeply regrets to inform you that your husband, Sergeant Alexei Andreyevich Dubyansky, was killed in action yesterday in the Traverse. The Minister for Defence and the Commandant extend their deepest sympathies to you and your family in your loss."

The words were like an axe to Valeriya Dubyansky's knees. She fell slowly, clutching the door frame until she was a puddle of a human being on the carpet. Tommy knelt and her arms came around him and clung, like a drowning child.

"Lyosha," she whimpered into his chest, her hair catching in his ribbon rack. "Oh Lyosha."

Some said you shouldn't hug the next of kin. But Tommy knew, like he knew Matthieu was still watching his back, that Alexei Andreyevich was watching him right now. Saying, _don't let me down, brother. _

And so he held her as she shook and Santiago hovered in the doorway.


	3. The Marsh Flies - Part One

_Second Lieutenant Emilia Shepard_  
OIC 2nd Platoon, Charlie Company, 2/3rd Marines, 19th Marine Expeditionary Unit  
'Lancer White'

August 2175, Yamm 

The stink of the swamp followed them wherever they went, from the squelchy, muddy FOB Hope to the mostly solid ground they'd built their outpost on, overlooking the town of Tamer. It followed them now as the three vehicles ground their way down the hill, wheels digging into thick, black muck of the track. It was hell to clean off, that mud, and most of the ground wasn't suitable for their heavy Grizzly IFVs.

So they were stuck in their Bengal 'infantry mobility vehicles', with only heavy machine guns mounted on the roof. It made Second Lieutenant Emilia Shepard oddly nervous, even though her combat experiences thus far had been the typical space Marine bullshit - a combat drop onto an attacked colony and a boarding action. She hadn't had the protection of tanks then either.

"Nah, man, I'm telling you," Lance Corporal Solar insisted, drumming his fingers against the driving wheel as he stared at the end of the Bengal in front of them, "Rios wouldn't just be great in bed, that'd be a fuckin _lifechanger_, bro."

"Dude," Lance Corporal Lakatos retorted even as he swiveled the turret, "she's like, a hundred."

"That's just 'cause you're immature, Laka. A real man can appreciate _class_."

Maybe it was just the change of pace that had Shepard's skin crawling. They were part of a MEU - a quick reaction force across the colonies. They lived on warships, ready to drop into combat wherever and whenever they were needed at the drop of a hat. But the colonial government of Yamm had complained about a rise in violence from criminals that used the planet's constant storms and vast unexplored territories to hide from the long arm of the law, and here she was. At least until a more permanent taskforce arrived.

Staff Lieutenant Cormac had even nixed her first choice of outpost. They were here to protect the people of Tamer, so screw your very defensible hill, Lieutenant! Use this smaller, closer one instead and patrol your blindspots.

The days had fallen into the same stinking, mud splattered pattern. She or Tan took a patrol out or went and talked to the mayor to hear his never-ending barrage of complaints. If they were lucky some of the cartel or pirate gang members might take a shot at them.

She was a hamster on a wheel.

"They put somethin' in the water on Benning to make you start hanging around nursing homes, you deviant?"

"She's rich!" protested Solar. The Bengal groaned as he forced it up and over a fallen tree trunk. "Rich people don't get saggy anythin'. Experience and beauty, my friend."

"Deviant," Lakatos decided cheerily.

"Fuck you, man. You don't know shit. What do you reckon, LT?"

They didn't put this part in OCS. Warning, prospective infantry officers: you will get to know much, much more about the sex lives of a bunch of horny twenty year olds than you'd ever want to.

"I think..." she paused, pretending to think about it, "You should shut up and drive."

"Roger, ma'am," Solar sighed, "you're supposed to be the Fun Lieutenant."

"I'm not sure whether to be flattered or scared by that, Lance Corporal."

Though she supposed there wasn't much competition in her company for 'fun lieutenant'. Her shipboard roommate and First Platoon's commander was a ringknocker and Third Platoon's was well respected but very sober.

She knew that because she'd done her best to get him drunk. The less said about the XO the better.

"She's just worried about your crappy driving," Lakatos cracked.

"The roads are just shit!" Solar grumbled, "Why are you such a dick, Laka? What'd I ever do to you?"

"You're a nerd."

"Yeah, see if I fix your hardsuit next time it's on the fritz because you suck at maintenance."

"That's just mean."

Shepard fixed her gaze out the window, at the passing thick green trunks of the local 'trees'. Apparently they had little in common with the Terran equivalent - in fact there'd been at least three slides in the safety briefing slideshow about not burning, licking or ingesting any of the local plant life. They crowded up the muddy track of a road like a wall.

The locals just called these 'the Hills'. They were fond of that. 'The Hills', 'the City', 'the Base'. Like her little shitty outpost could really be called a military base. Tamer and its few thousand biofuel farmers were their own small, self-contained world. Shepard and her Marines were interlopers or curiosities in their eyes.

After a few months here she could almost feel her outlook shrinking, compressing into these few square kilometres she was responsible for.

The Army couldn't get here quickly enough.

_"Lancer White Actual, this is Lancer White One. Drones picked up a couple of young men up the road with a skycar, over." _

Shepard straightened, "Any signs of weapons, over?"

_"None visible, over." _

It was still a bit odd - a couple of guys out in the middle of the Hills in the middle of the day when most would be working.

"Copy that. We'll stop and have a chat to them, see if they've seen anything lately, over."

_"Roger that. One out." _

"Pull off the road just here, Solar," she ordered. He did as told, parking the Bengal IMV with its blunt nose nearly touching the nearest dark olive trunk. The rest of the patrol did similarly - a herringbone of dark painted military vehicles, two either side of the track.

The mud squelched under her boots when she jumped out of the IMV. For a moment she teetered, worried she might lose her balance as a foot slipped, but thankfully she stayed upright.

Lakatos would crack jokes at her expense the entire ride back to the outpost if she fell on her arse.

The two human men watched her approach as Sergeant Vanh fell in at her side. They were both in their twenties if she had to guess, muscular from farm work and dressed in the drab colours the locals seemed to prefer. One of them had a few bits of peach fuzz clinging to his narrow chin.

They wore identical suspicious glares. She wasn't surprised at this point. If you wore Alliance blue colonists either loved you and bought you a few rounds at the pub or they hated you and you were more likely to get a punch. Or a lengthy tirade about how taxation was theft, but Shepard preferred the punches.

"Evening, gentlemen." Her voice came out in a hiss through her helmet's speakers.

"Something wrong, officer?"

Lieutenant, damnit. She wasn't a cop. "Nothing wrong, just wondering what you're all doing out here this time of day."

"It illegal now?" the one who really needed to shave asked, scratching his jaw.

"Nope. But you might've heard there's been a few attacks recently. My Marines and I have been shot at, few people have had their biofuel siphoned." The next AO over a whole family had disappeared in a nighttime attack and a Marine had been seriously hurt in a shootout. More offworld criminal elements, her company commander said. Terminus elements, he meant. "Just wondering if you've seen anything suspicious recently."

Peach Fuzz stared at her. "Nothing I can remember, officer."

"You got your ID on you?" Vanh asked from her side, her voice calm but sharpened like a knife. The sergeant was clearly happy to play Bad Cop.

"Gotta fuckin' show ID on our own goddamned planet," the other one muttered, "that's fuckin' tyranny."

"Well," Shepard said faux politely, "you can take it up with your elected representative, sir. The emergency powers were passed by the colonial administration before they asked for federal troops. We're just trying to keep you all safe."

"Yeah, whatever."

"ID," Vanh insisted.

Shepard scanned Peach Fuzz's ID chit with her omnitool. Alliance citizen, worker for one of the bigger family biofuel farms, resident of Tamer. All in order. She handed it back. "Thanks. Have a good night, both of you."

Vanh was tense at her side as they walked back towards their vehicles. Shepard shot her a sideways glance. Vanh was usually the calmest, most rock solid of her squad leaders -without Whitman's nerves or Rosenberg's savage temper. "You alright?"

"We should've checked the car," Vanh muttered, dark eyes darting across at her. "Doesn't feel right. They really didn't want us sticking around, ma'am."

Shepard frowned at her. "They were sullen, sure, but c'mon. They probably just had some weed in the car or something. We can't suspect everyone we come across."

Vanh's eyes seemed to express she thought that they could - and should.

"We have our orders," Shepard tried again, "we're here to help the people of Yamm. Not to manhandle them around over hunches."

"Yamm..." Vanh shook her head, "ma'am, our first priority should be this platoon, not the feelings of these colonists."

"Sergeant..."

"Sorry, ma'am. Just worried about some of the things that I've been hearing. You can rely on me."

"I know I can, Bian. Let's just...get mounted up and finish this patrol. Maybe we'll even get some hot water in the showers tonight."

Vanh snorted. "I wish I had your optimism, LT."

She climbed back into the Bengal - goddamn, did they have to build them so far off the ground? Solar and Lakatos were bickering again.

"LT, can you settle something for us?" Lakatos asked.

Shepard sighed. "What is it?"

"Did you ever play biotiball? Alvarez won't tell us anything."

_Ah, Jules. Knew I could rely on you, even for the small shit._ It'd been real weird at first, going from two idiot privates together to Jules being one of her team leaders, but they'd done their best to keep the friendship stuff off duty.

"What, cause I'm a biotic I had to have played biotiball?" she raised an eyebrow at him.

He wilted a little. Under the banter and typical twenty year old bluster, Laka just was too nice for his own good. He'd even packed Solar and her lunch like a soccer mum. "Sorry, LT, didn't mean it like that."

"Relax, man," she grinned at him under her visor, "I'm just fucking with you. Yeah, I played biotiball on Arcturus Station. Not enough biotic kids around to have a proper league though - not like the Citadel or the Republics."

"That's pretty fuckin' cool, ma'am," he nodded, "reckon you could do one of those fancy scoring moves?"

She considered that. Set up a bin as a goal, use the vehicle bay, have medigel nearby. "Hell yeah."

He fistpumped.

She tapped Solar's shoulder. "Pull out behind Richards."

"Copy that."

"Man," Shepard complained as the IMVs started to climb up the ridgeline, "I can't wait until we're back on the _Cairo_."

"You just wanna get laid," Solar muttered.

She raised an eyebrow at him, "I'm not the one thirsting over Colombia Rios."

Lakatos sniggered from the back.

"Maybe, Solar," she said, "you'll have better luck with the ladies if you think of a relationship as more than just getting laid. I miss my fiancee for more than that, you know? I enjoy her company. You should try it sometime."

She did hope Rita wasn't opposed to the getting laid part though. It'd been a long few months with the Marines on the ground and the _Cairo _in orbit, and they hadn't had extranet or personal comm time for the first two.

"Maybe he's just a nerd, ma'am," Lakatos interjected.

"That's a possibility too. Fuckin' engineers."

"Really feeling the love tonight," Solar grumbled.

Her comm crackled with Corporal Richards' indistinct voice. Shepard frowned, raising a hand to cut off the joking and tapped the side of her helmet like she could hit the implant until it worked. "Say again, over?"

Then everything seemed to slow - a single moment stretched and stretched like plastic. All she could feel was pressure in her ears and heat all over, searing through the ceramic layers of her hardsuit, and then the crack of her head hitting the frame of the vehicle, white light bursting behind her eyes.

She wanted to grab something - hold on - but the Bengal was inexorably rolling and rolling and -

Finally stopping, crashed over on its side in the black mud.

All she could hear was the ringing in her ears and all she could taste was acrid smoke._ Fuck me. Fuck me, we just got blown up._

They'd been blown up and she was the platoon leader. She had to - she had to-

Her head felt triple its normal weight as Shepard forced herself to sit up, her shoulder shrieking - she'd landed on it. Better than her head, maybe.

"Guys? Guys, are you alright?" She waved a hand fruitlessly in front of her face, trying to clear the air, "Laka! Solar!"

"Fuck..." the groan was low and weak, "fuckin-"

The IMV was the wrong shape. Bent, the cabin forced up and half detached from the engine block below. Tattered streamers of light came in the cracked windscreen in front of her. And beside her - no, below her, the dash - the dash and wheel had collapsed in and crunched down on Solar's legs. The explosive must have gone off under his side.

"Shit."

His face was pale as a ghost under his visor. "LT, I think I'm fucked up."

"I'm gonna get you. Just wait a second." She was held up by her restraints and nothing else. If she just released it, she'd fall onto him. And he was - he was 'fucked up'.

"LT! Eric!" Lakatos' voice was thin.

"We're here," she called back, "what's your status? Solar's wounded."

"Rung like a bell, ma'am, but I don't think anything is gonna fall off," he called back. "And I think we're taking fire."

As if to punctuate what he'd said, she heard the ping of a bullet off the Bengal's armoured side. Of course. Of fucking course.

"I'm...I'm gonna try and get Solar out." She braced herself with her feet against the frame of the vehicle before she pulled the restraints open. She climbed down carefully, trying not to jostle Solar. There was blood coating her tongue. She must've bitten her tongue.

"Where's everyone?" Solar grabbed at her arm as she tried to work out how she was going to get him out of his seat. He left smears of sticky blood on her black-blue armour.

"They won't leave us here," she told him. They wouldn't. Vanh might push through the ambush the way they drilled because it was the smart thing to do, the thing that got the least amount of Marines fucked up, but they'd never leave them behind. But right now, she needed to get him out of there.

She breathed in, focused past the ringing in her ears, the red hot pain of her shoulder and neck and head, past the occasional sound of bullet off armour. Blue light flooded the smoky interior and Eric Solar shrieked as her biotics forced the metal back and away from him.

Blood. Blood everywhere. His legs were red meat. She dropped the biotic field and fumbled for her webbing. No time to try and put medigel over everything. Back to the basics. Her hands shook as she pulled off the cracked armour covering his upper legs, and then tightened both of their tourniquets around each of his thighs until he swore and tried to push her away.

"Alright." she breathed in. Out. "Alright." She was their platoon commander. She needed to be in control. But fuck - how could she be in control when they'd been fucking blown up and she could see the bones of Solar's legs?

The vehicle shuddered with a muffled roar. A near miss from a rocket launcher.

"We need to get outta here," Lakatos called from the back, "I got my MG, I'll go first, lay down some fire if you can get him out by yourself, ma'am."

"Yeah. Yeah, that works."

Lakatos' boots scrabbled against metal as he climbed out. Soon she heard the dull roar of his light machinegun. Time to move. She forced her door open with a mnemonic, sunlight filtering down over the two of them.

She pulled herself up, arms protesting the weight of her body and armour, and rolled onto the back side door. Solar looked up at her from where he was curled up in the remains of his seat, his eyes a startling blue contrast to his pale face.

"I'm sorry," she said, feeling the buzz of her biotics reverbrating through her teeth. There was no way to do this without causing him more pain.

"It's okay, LT," he told her.

He still screamed when she used her biotics to pull him up and out. She wrapped her arms around his chest and dropped them both to the ground beside Lakatos. The Lance Corporal's head lolled back on his neck, his breathing shallow.

The Bengal had rolled off the road and slid down the embankment, gouging the soft, dark soil. Lakatos was firing in bursts up - up at the dark green trees, up at the flashes of gunfire. She could hear the rounds striking around them - glancing off the gravel track, flicking off the Bengal's metal carcass. The vehicle and the embankment gave them some cover, but they'd never get Solar out of here without getting shot.

Shepard rolled onto her stomach, blinking at her HUD - looking for biosign indicators, the unit tracker, but it was all fuzzy static. The crash must have damaged her helmet computer.

"Piece of shit," she snarled to herself, turning it off so it wouldn't be distracting, and pulling up her omnitool. A lieutenant's real weapon was their comm unit. She just needed to -

_"-White Actual, this is Lancer White One. Do you copy, over?" _Vanh's voice was taut, sharp.

She'd never been so happy to hear the sergeant's voice in her life. "One, this is Actual. Sitrep, over."

Relief flooded Vanh's voice_ , "Actual, we're in contact with a squad sized force of infantry. We've pushed through the ambush and are dismounting to counter attack. No casualties, over." _

"Copy that. Solar is wounded and we're under fire. We're not going to be able to move, over." Shepard was surprised at how calm her voice sounded - even as a bullet cracked above her. She felt outside herself, like all emotion had been stripped out and neatly boxed away.

_"Roger that," _Vanh replied grimly, _"Lancer White One out." _

All she could do was try to keep herself and her two Marines alive until Vanh and the rest of First Squad pushed up. Easy. Right.

"Reloading," Lakatos hissed over to her, ejecting a cherry red heatsink that sizzled as it hit fallen leaves.

Shepard flicked the select fire lever on her rifle to burst and wriggled forward on her elbows, bracing it against her shoulder. There - a flash of movement. She squeezed the trigger once, then twice. She could hear the snap of rounds tearing through foliage, dashing off the thick green tree trunks.

"Oh shi-" Lakatos bit off and Shepard saw it - the grenade that bounced across the gravel and then rolled down the embankment towards them.

She reacted - threw herself on top of Solar's prone form, forcing a dome of blue out around them. He shrieked, hands shoving at her chest but failing to dislodge her weight.

The grenade went off. The world narrowed to the dull roar in her ears, the snapping of shrapnel, the cloud of dirt and smoke. She gritted her teeth as each strike wore away at her barrier until she felt like her head might explode from the effort.

And then the dust began to settle.

She rolled off Solar. "Lakatos?"

Silence. His back was to her and unmoving, the machinegun still propped against the embankment.

"Laka?" she reached for his shoulder and tugged.

There were red gouges carved through the chest of his armour, white bone poking through. His visor was cracked in, his jaw hanging at a sickening angle.

Shepard stared at him. An hour ago he'd been making jokes, asking to see her biotiball moves. Last month at 0400 he'd called Bian 'ma' while still half asleep and the rest of the platoon hadn't let him forget it.

He'd been _hers _and she hadn't protected him. She'd let him die next to a road in the middle of fucking nowhere on a rock no one cared about.

Footsteps crunching against gravel. Three men in cobbled together combat gear, rifles in hand - looking to finish off or capture them or loot their corpses. They were laughing - exhilarated laughter. They'd killed her Marine and they were _laughing _about it.

They weren't laughing when she rose to her feet, glowing a violent blue, and propelled them into the tree trunks hard enough to crush bone.


	4. Morning

Warm sunlight filtered through the half-closed curtains to splash across the sheets and the bare skin of Shepard's shoulders. She grumbled, pressing her face deeper into the pillow. She was not getting up, open curtains or not.

For the first time in months she had nowhere to be and she wanted nothing more than to sleep in past six am. There was always some emergency with ship or crew, even when they were docked, and as much as she loved her command she was relieved to be a few light years away from it.

A warm hand curled against her bicep.

Maybe that was another reason to be relieved.

"Mm," Ash pulled her closer, lips pressing lazily to her shoulder, eyes closed against the morning light. Shepard, mind still fuzzy with sleep, smiled at the sight of her - stretched across Shepard's bed, grabby even now. She didn't think she'd ever seen Ash relax like this, not even the first time they'd slept together. Getting caught had been too present in their minds.

Right now it felt like they were in a bubble, hidden away from things like Reapers and regulations.

Ash grumbled, pressing her face into the hollow of Shepard's neck. She kissed her cheek, her forehead, skin warm against her lips, arm wrapping around her waist.

"Go back to sleep. Too early," Ash murmured, words muffled.

It was nine, long after both of them would usually be up for their morning run. But they were on rr and no one needed them. A little more time in bed wouldn't hurt anyone. They could indulge for once.

So Shepard smiled and kissed her on the nose, enjoying the way it wrinkled in response - 'cute' wasn't usually something she could call her girlfriend. And then she let herself sink back into her bed, letting sleep wrap around her like a warm blanket.


	5. Unbecoming

When the first fist crashed into her jaw, First Lieutenant Emilia Shepard could admit that perhaps she made a bad decision. She reeled back against the bar, grabbing at her face as a man loomed over her, dressed in a beer stained Navy uniform, his lip bleeding from the impact of her knuckles.

Space had cleared around them as the other bar customers backed away, not eager to get involved in yet another military bar fight. She wasn't sure where the bartender had gone. Pussy. She pushed herself up-right with a smirk, wiping the back of her hand across her face.

The man's voice was slurred and thick, and she couldn't really understand what he was yelling at her about, only that he seemed like he wanted to take his issue out on her face.

"Look man," she said, "I just wanted a fucking drink. How about you fuck off back to whatever hole you crawled out of?"

The evening had started as it usually did, with a call from her wife. Rita was currently deployed aboard a frigate. Rita was doing the job she was trained to do - hunting pirates and policing the borders. Rita wasn't stuck on Arcturus. And like usual, she wanted to know how things were going. With the therapy, with the medical appointments, with this new joke of a posting. Like usual it ended with awkward goodbyes and with the lieutenant in a bar.

It wasn't like she could ask Rita to come home. She'd already put her career on hold for eight months because of her - gone to every appointment, asked all the questions while Shepard sat in sullen silence.

"Fuck you," the sailor slurred. Unfortunately for him, she was a special forces officer - at least by training, if not according to current assignment. He lashed out with one huge fist, but she sidestepped, grabbed him by the beefy wrist and twisted, propelling him face first into the bar surface. She heard something crunch.

The next thing she heard was the sudden cut of the bar's music as the white lights flooded on.

"MPs! Stay where you are!"

She sighed, stepping away from the groaning man and raising her hands where the Marine military police could see her hands. Soon both she and the sailor were in handcuffs.

"This one's a biotic!" One of the MPs called, an edge of fear lacing his voice. Shepard soon found herself against a wall, metal panelling cold against her cheek.

"Be careful with that," she told the man when he popped out the amp, "That's government property, you know."

He ignored her.

Before long she found herself alone in a holding cell, watched over by two young Marine MPs.

This wasn't the first time she'd been in a cell in her Marine Corps career, but it was the first time since she'd become an officer. Her commander was going to have a fit when he got the call - and she doubted he was coming to get her until the morning. At first he'd tried all the tricks she'd used herself, but the haranguing, the inspirational speeches, it had all stopped in the last few weeks. She felt a little bit of twisted pride that she'd gotten him to give up.

In the list of bad decisions she'd made since Elysium, this wasn't high on the list.

"So," she leaned against the wall, languid from the alcohol, "what's with the separate cell? When I was a Lance, they just threw me in the drunk tank."

The two Marine MPs glanced at each other nervously. They'd worked out when putting her arrest into the system that they'd just arrested the 'Lion of Elysium' and they didn't seem quite sure whether to go all 'yes ma'am, no ma'am' or treat her like any other drunk dragged in on a Friday night.

The answer, Shepard knew, was the latter, but that would make her night very boring. She liked people, liked talking to them, liked ferreting out what made them tick. Richardson had watched her speaking to their XO once, then called her a 'manipulative fuck, ma'am' but it'd gotten him the HMG lubricant he'd needed.

And then the stupid fuck had pushed her out of the way of a blast of acid, like he didn't have a family to go home to. There were a few times, late at night with a whole bottle of whiskey in her, when it was dark and quiet, where she resented him for it. A lieutenant was meant to die with her Marines.

"It's uh, policy, ma'am, with biotics." One of them said quietly, looking at her boots.

She smiled gently and the PFC promptly blushed.

"It's alright. You two are just doing your jobs."

"Yes ma'am," the other young Marine said with a smile that brightened his young face.

She was only twenty-four, but God, sometimes Shepard felt like an old woman compared to these young enlisted with the baby fat still clinging to their cheeks and stars in their eyes. War was fought by children.

Shepard was deep into conversation about their career plans and Private Ippolito's issues with his mother when the door to the cell block hissed open, followed by a heavy tread of booted feet. The two Marines went ramrod straight.

"Commander Anderson, sir!"

"Anderson," she said easily, swaying only a tiny bit as she came to the bars, "here to bail me out?"

He looked at her, expressionless, from the top of her messy curls to her pants, currently with a beer stain on one leg.

"Corrupting the enlisted, are we Lieutenant?"

"Givin' a little career advice is all, sir."

Anderson ignored her, hands clasped behind his back when he turned his gaze to Ippolito, who looked like he wanted to melt into the floor, "Release Lieutenant Shepard, if you'd be so kind, Private."

"Aye sir!"

The square near her apartment was still and quiet at this time of 'night' - Arcturus had aligned itself with Geneva Time traditionally and most of her neighbours were also Alliance personnel, either in the military or in the diplomatic service. Anderson was a silent and judgemental presence at her back.

She kinda wanted to tell him to just fuck off and leave her alone, but he had bailed her out.

Her apartment was dark when Emilia Shepard staggered her way in after fumbling through the lock. Fucking Arcturus. Why did they need key chits anyway? Couldn't they just biometric data or something? Arcturus was home, but she was starting to think absence made the heart grow fonder. It felt like a box folded in around her these days.

Anderson's bag was on her couch as well as a - bucket?

"Made yourself at home, huh?" she mumbled, throwing her wallet onto the bench beside an empty take out container.

"You gave me keys, remember?" he said, shoulders still straight like he was on the parade ground.

"Right…yeah."

"Rita's worried about you."

She was half expecting him to say 'I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed' like he'd never cut loose in his time.

She blinked slowly at him. The room was still a bit…wobbly.

"Rita should be…you know worrying about her ship and crew! 'Cause they're deployed. I'm just…babysitting POGs,"

He shook his head and then moved -

Old bastard was fast and blood strong.

The water was cold and sharp, like blades of ice on her face. She was spluttering and gasping when Anderson hauled her out by her collar and tossed her aside like a bag of potatoes. Shepard hit the deck, still gasping for breath, curls stuck to her face. Then the anger rose, thick and choking, a red haze over everything. The rage she'd tried so fucking hard to beat into submission so she could be the good little officer, waiting to be allowed back out of the cage.

Shepard surged to her feet, carried by her anger and sudden sobriety, blue sparking between her fingers.

Fuck. This. Shit.

"Go fuck yourself," she hissed, "Sir."

Anderson planted himself squarely across from her, arms folded and his eyes stormy, "What part of this seems like conduct becoming of an officer, Lieutenant?"

She sneered, "You think I give a shit anymore, Commander?"

He frowned at her and it was like a punch to the gut - all concerned, disappointed father figure.

"No. You don't get to show up here and judge me when you haven't been here!" Her voice was rising now. Her wife, her friends had all gone back out with the fleet and she'd been left here. A waste, only still in uniform because they wanted their goddamn decorative war hero.

"This isn't like you, Shepard," his voice was steel, said without words you're acting like a child. "you know Marines look up to their officers. You used to care about that - about being an officer your enlisted you could trust and count on! Getting drunk for drunk and disorderly is far from appropriate, and that's not even getting into what your CO has been saying about you."

"My career is over anyway," she said morosely, "they cleared me just so they could have their fucking 'Lion of Elysium' in a cage to trot out in front of politicians. They're never giving me another N5 billet. They think I'm bad luck, that I got my Marines killed."

Something gentled in Anderson's expression. "Emilia. You know that's not true."

She shrugged weakly. "Sure. But what happened and what people think happened - that's two different things, Anderson."

He kneaded his forehead before he raised his head and looked her square in the eye, "You've been through a lot these past few years. Elysium, Akuze, now being stuck here. No one could blame you for reaching your limit. But Emilia, the one thing you can control in this life is yourself." He reached into his pocket and put a datapad in her hand. "Read it."

Interplanetary Combatives Training - Operator Training Course.

Her head shot up, an ember of hope fluttering into a flame inside her chest. "Sir?"

"I'm not going to lie," he warned, "there's suitability tests before they even throw you into Operator Selection and if you fail their interviews you could find yourself back in front of a medboard. But get yourself cleaned up and pass that - and what happens afterwards is entirely in your hands."

Shepard tightened her grip on the datapad, wondered out loud, "N7?"

Anderson smiled, a flash of warmth and white teeth, "You've always aimed high."

She breathed out, squared her shoulder, "Alright, sir, if you're done re-enacting the Manhunt, I'm going to have a shower and get some sleep. I have some training to do in the morning."

He chuckled. "You do look like you're getting soft around the edges."

Shepard flipped him off over her shoulder.


	6. After The First

The sun was dripping behind the hills, casting shadow across the newly renamed Combat Outpost Lakatos, as Second Lieutenant Emilia Shepard leant against the sand-filled wire mesh barrier that made up the walls, smoking. She'd never been much of a smoker before they'd come to this shitty little planet, but she'd found it settled the nerves - and gave you something to do with your hands. Plus, she preferred the smell of tobacco smoke over the stink of the marshes.

Around her moved her Marines in their mud-streaked armour. Some of them were on watch, manning the machine guns mounted in the watchtowers, others were wrestling or playing cards or just sleeping.

She got a few nods, but for the most part they left their young commander in peace.

No one had ever told her that being the one officer in an infantry platoon would sometimes feel like you were entirely alone. Or that she'd struggle for days trying to think of how to word a letter to the parents of a man you watched die.

_He didn't see it coming. _Well, he had. He'd been the one to see it. _He didn't feel any pain. _Maybe. It'd been quick, if not a pretty way to die.

"Fuck." She dropped her cigarette and ground it out in the mud. She felt like she needed to move or do something, but this was part and parcel of war, or peacekeeping or whatever the fuck they were doing. You sat on your COP and hoped to be attacked just so the boredom wouldn't kill you.

Shepard and her Platoon Sergeant, Staff Sergeant Tan, had been sharing accomodation. A double hootchie, perched on the least shitty, least cracked mud the pair could find, was - and had been - their home for the past few months.

Tan, wearing his armour and greaves, but foregoing the helmet for a soft, steel-grey boonie hat this side of the wire, returned to their shared quarters. He looked displeased, but not quite grim.

He didn't bother to salute as he approached, throwing his rifle on top of his sleeping bag. "Ma'am? How are you? I just did a kit inspection on third squad. I've got a list of missing, ill-fighting, or damaged equipment." He handed her a datapad. "For your reading pleasure," he added dryly.

She took it and scanned it. "Fuck me, the drones are worse than useless in these conditions. I'll write it up for the company, but the skipper isn't going to be happy. We're still waiting on a replacement for the - for the truck we lost."

The IMV that had blown up with Shepard, Lakatos and Solar inside. They'd survived thanks to all the armour piled onto them, but the truck had been as fucked up as Solar's legs.

Tan gave her a hard look. One she was probably getting used to by now - that intensity, like he was solving a puzzle. His words, however, were much, much softer than his narrowed eyes.

"Would you like to take a walk with me, ma'am? I have something I'd like to talk about." It was a careful request, letting the Lieutenant know that he respected her right to be alone, but it was very clear that he thought it was in her best interest to accompany him.

She tossed the datapad inside the hooch to land on her sleeping bag for later. "Sure."

She fell into lockstep with him. Like Tan and a lot of the Marines she'd gotten tired of wearing full kit after a few weeks. She was wearing her body armour, pistol and open helmet, but not the full sealed hardsuit.

Shepard wasn't looking forward to her next conversation with Cormac. After the ambush, the Marines at COP Lakatos had started taking fire more regularly. The assholes would use the larger hill nearby to get firing positions on the COP despite her platoon patrolling daily. At least she'd been given a militia mortar team to supplement her light infantry platoon. ta

They hadn't gotten far before Tan spoke. "How's your fiancee, ma'am? Have you been managing to stay in touch?"

"Yeah, I send her emails. Not getting much vid time though," she said, distracted, "Richards! Are you watching that hill?"

Corporal Richards jerked, surprised, from her post in the nearby 'watchtower' - really just stacked barrier blocks with a sandbag and plywood roof. "Yes ma'am?"

"Are you asking me?" Shepard asked, her voice taking on a harsh edge.

"I - no, ma'am, sorry ma'am. I'm keeping an eye on it."

"Good," the lieutenant said shortly.

"If you see movement, we can see about getting the mortar on it right away," he added. They continued on.

"I'm glad. Was it jarring, becoming a mustang? There's two Marine Corps', isn't there? I remember what it was like being a junior enlisted - and I'm sure you do too. Very different."

Shepard shot Tan an appraising look. "It's very different, yeah. I miss being a corporal sometimes. I hope that I never forget what it's like being a lance corporal or a PFC. I don't ever want to end up like fuckin' Lieutenant Ringknocker." referring to her shipboard roommate, Lieutenant Dowdy, "What's with the twenty questions tonight, S'arnt?"

Tan led her over to the side of a makeshift shed, where cans, MREs and the sparingly few fridges were slowly perishing. He sighed. "We've made a good team, ma'am. In a lot of ways. It's because of our respective histories, our chemistry, and most importantly, our ability to speak openly with one another. This brings me no pleasure." He sighed once more.

"You've had your first death under your command. I hear things. I see things. Between the two of us, I hope, we find little room for secrets. I'm a little worried, ma'am. And I wouldn't be doing my duty to you or the platoon if I didn't check in. You're my Marine as much as I'm yours."

"I'm okay," she insisted, "I - a few nightmares, but that's usual, right?" She still didn't know how to word her email describing how he'd died to his family, but that was usual too. Right?

Tan smiled, but his eyes crinkled the wrong way, tinged with sadness. "If there's one word that doesn't go along with this process, it's 'usual'."

His smile faded and a more open, yet hollow, look appeared on his face instead. "And it is a process. But that's why I play twenty questions. I know it's hard, right? You can't jot down your thoughts to your fiance, can you? And you're the only officer out this far. We're the most lonely people in the galaxy. Lonesome and grief are the worst couple."

She crossed her arms, staring at the muddy ground. "We were all joking around. Before the IED. What if I missed something?"

Lakatos had been laughing, brown eyes lit up. He'd been kind and funny, and now he was very dead, and Shepard had seen his face get blown off. How was that fair?

"I won't lie and say it's not possible. But an IED? How many vehicles do they knock out in a year? It's unlikely. Besides, you can't help building a rapport with those you spend the most time with."

Tan sighed a third time, breaking his gaze with Shepard's face to examine his hands for a moment, but then his eyes levelled again. "We live in this reality. What you did, after the vehicle was hit, was exactly correct. And that quick thinking, refusing to be rattled, you saved Solar's life. If there's one thing I've learned, it's to not dwell on mistakes or what could have been."

"I feel like I let him down," she admitted quietly, "he always had my back."

"He did. But that doesn't mean you let him down. You'd be hard pressed to find a Marine who thought their life matters more than the Marine standing next to them. Lakatos wouldn't have traded with either of you."

"I know." It was true. No one wanted anyone to die for them."It just- fuck, it sucks. It wasn't even slaves." She kicked an empty can that someone had left on the floor. It hit the side of the shed with a metallic ring. "I know it's stupid but I really thought I could bring everyone home."

"I'm sorry. We'll always try. But, sometimes we can't. And it does fucking suck when we can't. You're not stupid for hoping, Shepard."

"Yeah," she rubbed her face, "Fuck this planet, honestly. Are the Marines holding up?"

Lakatos had been well liked.

"As best as they can. Morale will always take a dive after we lose someone. Lakatos was…" Tan smiled again, but this time there was some mirth to it. "Unique. We're all looking forward to getting off the line and giving him a proper send off."

"Yeah." She smiled as well. He had been special, "Remember when he called Vanh 'mum'? I know he'd want us to raise a few drinks in his honour. His parents asked me what happened but I haven't been able to finish the email yet."

Tan chortled. "No one would have ever let him forget it. 'Does mum need to get you some milk, Lakatos?'" He let the smile fade.

"That's one particular part of the job I don't have much experience in, unfortunately. If you need help though, I'm happy to. Of course, if you feel like this is something you need to do yourself, I understand. I don't envy that position."

"I know I can't make it pretty, you know?" she shook her head, "He was brave, but it's not like he jumped on that grenade. He just - died. He didn't have a chance."

"They rarely do," the Staff Sergeant lamented. "That's the true horror of war, of battle, I feel. The chaotic… randomness of it. Sure, we have tactics, but sometimes… sometimes someone catches a stray bullet, or a grenade lands too close. But that's our horror to bear, not our parents or friends."

"Yeah. I just. I guess I can just put the facts, without the gory details. They don't need to know that." But she couldn't lie either. "And I can tell them how much we all loved him." She had. He'd been not just a good Marine but a good man. The kinda guy you wanted on your six.

"He tried hard, for sure. He wanted the platoon to like him and he wanted to do good. He would have made it far." But, sadly, he wouldn't anymore. "But you're right. They don't need the gory details. I'm here, if you feel the need to share that. And when we get back to an honest-to-God Marine Corps base, you can talk with a priest or a shrink. Whatever you need."

"Yeah." She gave him a thin smile, "Thanks for the chat, Tan."

Grey evening fell over the COP and the two of them in degrees.

"Anytime. I mean it. And do try and keep up with your officer friends where you can, too." He grinned at her. "You're definitely the most well-adjusted one I know, but the rest of them might have similar experiences. Oorah?"

"Oorah, Staff Sergeant. I'm gonna turn in for the night and try and write this letter."

Back in the hooch Shepard sat cross-legged on her sleeping back and brought up her omnitool.

_Mr and Mrs Lakatos..._


End file.
